Thursday, December 4, 2025

Supplementary Materials VI - The Unhelpful Oxymorons of “Biblical Authority” and “Inerrancy”



Supplementary Materials VI

The Unhelpful Oxymorons of
“Biblical Authority” and “Inerrancy”
 
Why Modern Doctrines Collapse Under
the Weight of Ancient Textual Realities

by R.E. Slater & ChatGPT-5


I. Introduction — When Modern Doctrines Meet Ancient Textual Realities

Modern Christian discourses around “biblical authority” and “inerrancy” are often presented as ancient, obvious, and self-evident truths - as though believers in antiquity approached Scripture with the same metaphysical expectations and epistemological assumptions that arose in the 19th and 20th centuries. But as soon as one reads the Bible historically, archaeologically, linguistically, or comparatively, an unavoidable truth emerges:

The Evangelical Insistence on Inerrancy is an oxymoron.

It is a doctrine built upon presumed conditions which never existed.

It assumes:

  • a finished canon before a canon existed,
  • a single author where multiple voices speak,
  • pristine autographs where only variants survive,
  • a unified theology where competing theologies coexist,
  • divine dictation where complex editorial processes took place,
  • and textual stability across centuries where the manuscripts show dynamic change.

The doctrine of an Inerrant Bible exists only in theory; the concept never existed in history, archaeology, manuscript tradition, or the lived experience of ancient Israel.

This essay examines why the modern doctrine of inerrancy collapses under scrutiny, while the Bible itself - when understood historically, critically, and relationally - becomes more sacred, not less. We will examine:

  • textual criticism,
  • redaction criticism,
  • Ancient Near Eastern comparative literature,
  • canon formation,
  • theological development within the Bible,
  • and a process-relational view of Scripture.

The goal is not to devalue Scripture but to understand how Scripture actually came into being - and why imposing perfection onto it distorts both a sacred developing faith and the text itself.

II. The Historical Oxymoron - The "Perfect" Bible That Never Existed

The modern doctrine of inerrancy presumes that at some point - especially at the beginning - the biblical text existed in a “perfect” form, free of error, contradiction, or variation.

Yet all historical evidence proves the opposite.

Manuscripts Tell a Different Story

What we possess:

  • No original autographs

  • Thousands of manuscripts, none identical

  • Multiple textual families:

    • Proto-Masoretic (Old Judean more narrow in focus)

    • Proto-Samaritan (Pentateuch only; ancestor to the Samaritan Pentateuch, SP)

    • Septuagintal Hebrew (Greek LXX)

  • Books with multiple editions (e.g., Jeremiah, Daniel, Samuel)

  • Significant divergences between Masoretic Text (MT) and Dead Sea Scrolls (DSS)

  • A canon that remained fluid for centuries

If God intended to give a perfect text, the historical result is baffling. Nothing about the textual transmission of Scripture resembles the stability required for inerrancy. In fact, the oldest biblical manuscripts testify not to fixity but to plurality - a dynamic, open, and living tradition.

Inerrancy imagines a pristine lake.
But actual Manuscript history reveals a flowing river.

III. The Literary Oxymoron - The Bible as a Multi-Voiced Library

The Bible is not a single book. It is a library, crafted across more than a millennium. Its books were shaped by:

  • different regions: Judah, Israel, Babylon, Persia
  • different political conditions
  • different theological schools
  • different social classes
  • different crises and hopes

The diversity of voices is not incidental; it is essential.

Contradictions Are Literary, Not PreSupposed "Errors"

Examples:

  • Two creation accounts (Genesis 1 vs. Genesis 2) with different orders, vocabularies, and theologies

  • Two flood narratives intricately woven together (a classic case of compositional layering)

  • Two histories of the monarchy (Samuel–Kings vs. Chronicles) with competing moral visions

  • Two theologies of suffering: Proverbs vs. Job

  • Two theologies of divine justice: Nahum vs. Jonah

  • Two portrayals of God’s character: Exodus 34 vs. portions of Joshua

An inerrantist must harmonize these differences.
A historian honors them.
A theologian learns from them.
A process thinker celebrates them.

The Bible’s pluralism is a feature of inspiration - not a defect!

IV. The Redactional Oxymoron - The Bible as a Product of Editorial Creativity

No doctrine is more incompatible with inerrancy than redaction criticism - the academic study of how editors shaped biblical texts.

Redaction criticism reveals a sacred truth:

The Bible is an edited theology, not a stenographically dictated doctrine. Mostly because the scribes of their day where interjecting their version of theology for Israel's present circumstances.
What Redactors Actually Did

Redactors (scribal editors) were theologians, authors, interpreters, community leaders, and compilers of tradition. They:

  • Combined multiple stories into unified narratives
  • Inserted theological commentary
  • Adapted older texts to new crises
  • Harmonized traditions while preserving tensions
  • Reframed stories for new audiences
  • Expanded books over centuries
  • Wove together disparate sources into canonical form
The Bible’s final shape is the result of centuries of editorial work, not a one-time event.

Examples of Redaction

1. The Pentateuch - Modern scholars do not agree on every detail of the Documentary Hypothesis, but they agree on the core fact: The Pentateuch is composite. Whether described as J, E, D, P, or via newer models, the evidence shows:
  • narrative seams
  • doubled episodes
  • stylistic shifts
  • theological differences
  • vocabulary clusters
  • source-fragments integrated across centuries
2. The Deuteronomistic History (Deuteronomy-Kings) - is likely compiled during the exile, it interprets all Israelite history through the lens of covenant violation - a theological project, not a neutral chronicle.

3. Chronicles rewrites Kings - Kings is nuanced, tragic, honest about failures. Chronicles is an idealized, pro-Davidic, post-exilic reinterpretation and a redactional commentary on national identity.

4. Isaiah (1–66) - Now understood as: First Isaiah (8th century), Second Isaiah (6th century exile), Third Isaiah (post-exilic). There is no single author/prophet named “Isaiah” that wrote the entire book; rather, it is a theological anthology of many voices and streams of authority.

5. The Gospels - Since this essay is OT-focused, we will note only briefly here: Matthew and Luke modify Mark as the base foundation; this shows that "scribal" redaction continued in the early church and is intrinsic to the theological development of Scripture.

Why Editorial Redaction Refutes Inerrancy

A text shaped by:

  • multiple communities
  • multiple authors
  • multiple theological evolutions
  • multiple historical settings

cannot be “perfectly unified,” because it was never meant to be.

Redaction is not a flaw - Redaction is how Scripture is Scripture and becomes a Sacred theology for today.

This is also the heart of process-based Jewish and Christian theology with it's insistence to allow the sacred (or God) mediate the moment rather than deny, alter, edit, or fixate personal life moments.

V. The Cultural Oxymoron -  A Bible Formed Through Borrowing, Inheriting, and Rewriting

Evangelical inerrancy assumes that Israel’s religion was wholly unique, untouched by external influence. Archaeology and comparative ANE studies show the opposite truth:

Israel is Always Conversant with Its Neighbors
The Bible contains Mesopotamian creation motifs, Mesopotamian flood traditions, Ugaritic divine council imagery, Ugaritic storm-god typology (Baal → early Yahwism), Egyptian wisdom literature, Hittite treaty structures, Persian mono-theologizing currents.

Theological Borrowing Does Not Diminish Scripture - It Deepens It
Borrowing can be adaptive, polemical, corrective, transformative, creative, theological.

As Example:
Genesis 1 is both a critique of, and a conversation with, Enuma Elish.
The Bible participates in the ancient world even as it transforms it.

VI. The Canonical Oxymoron - A Closed Canon in a Sacred World Requiring No Closure

  • Canon formation is one of the most misunderstood subjects in modern religious discourse.
  • Evangelical inerrancy requires a single, fixed canon.
  • Yet History gives us centuries of fluidity.
Torah, Prophets, Writings - Evidence a Long, Uneven Process
  • The Torah stabilizes first (Persian period)
  • The Prophets stabilize later
  • The Writings remain fluid well into the first century CE
There Were Competing Canons Before Christianity
At Qumran, we find:
  • Psalms in multiple orders
  • Jeremiah in multiple forms
  • Alternate versions of Daniel, and
  • “Rewritten Scripture” (Jubilees, Temple Scroll)
The Hebrew Canon is far broader than what Rabbinic Judaism later accepted
LXX vs MT

The Septuagint (LXX):
  • Includes books absent from MT
  • Represents Hebrew textual traditions older than MT
  • Was the Bible of the early Church
So then, which Canon is inerrant?

Early Christianity Inherits Multiple Canons
Orthodox, Catholic, and Protestant Bibles differ because the Hebrew Canon was negotiated, not dictated. The community's Sacred Canon reflected the community's sacred discernment, communal usage, liturgical preference, theological negotiation and debate, scribal and rabbinic consensus, and regional variance.

Basically, the community said: "These are the texts which shape us. Here we stay."

This is sacred discernment. Not divine stenography. There was no doctrine of divine inerrancy until it later developed in fundamental and evangelical churches of the 18th and 19th centuries. Until then, neither ancient Jews nor early Christians believed in mechanical inspiration. But they did believe in the Spirit working through communities, traditions, editors, and scribes.

VII. The Theological Oxymoron - God Evolves in Scripture, but Inerrancy Forbids It

A doctrine of inerrancy presumes theological stasis.
But the Bible reveals theological growth.

The Evolution of God in Israel’s Memory

  1. Polytheistic milieu → Yahweh as one among many.

  2. Proto-Henotheism (Monolatry) → “Yahweh alone” within a pantheon.

  3. National henotheism → Yahweh as Israel’s supreme deity.

  4. Covenantal monotheism → Yahweh as sole God of Israel.

  5. Universal monotheism → Second Isaiah’s vision of a cosmic deity.

Each stage arises from history:

  • exodus
  • monarchy
  • exile
  • return
  • Persian-period identity formation
  • Hellenistic struggle

God is not static in Scripture.
God’s people grow into deeper understandings of the divine.

VIII. The Experiential Oxymoron - Authority Without Perfection

Biblical authority has never depended on inerrancy.

The earliest Jews did not use Scripture as evangelicals do today.
Nor did Jesus.
Nor did Paul.
Nor the rabbis.
Nor the early Church.

Divine Authority was always:

  • relational
  • liturgical
  • communal
  • moral
  • interpretive
  • dialogical

To demand mechanical inerrancy is to impose a late-modern epistemology on an ancient relational document.

IX. A Process-Theological Coda - Scripture as a Living Archive of Divine–Human Becoming

Process theology offers a framework that honors Scripture as:

  • relational,
  • historical,
  • multi-voiced,
  • dynamic,
  • evolutionary,
  • emergent.

Revelation is not a one-time deposit ... but a continuing conversation.

The Bible becomes Sacred through:

  • historical memory and recovery
  • personal, communal, and national trauma
  • creativity
  • critique
  • revision
  • reinterpretation
  • community consensus
  • moral transformation

This view does not diminish the Bible’s sacredness ... It reveals the Bible’s actual sacredness.

Scripture is a testimony to the evolving relationship between God and a people striving to understand the Sacred.

It is not a monologue.
But it is a dialogue.

It is not a perfect blueprint.
But it is a living archive and testimony and witness.

X. Conclusion - Why Letting Go of Inerrancy Saves the Bible and possibly your faith

The Bible is far too rich, too layered, too human, too divine, too contradictory, too wise, too complex, too sacred to be reduced to inerrancy.

Letting go of inerrancy does not destroy Scripture.
It liberates Scripture - and its readers fearful of losing truth.

We encounter the Bible not as a flawless (divine) dictation, but as a sacred companion across centuries of human experience and divine encounter.

This is not a loss of authority.

It is the rediscovery of a deeper, more sacred, authority - rooted in relationship, transformation, and the ongoing adventure of becoming.


~ Continue to Part V, Essay VII ~


Evolution of Worship & Religion
  • Part IV - The Sacred Made Universal
    • Essay 9 - The Age of Universal Religions
    • Essay 10 - Modernity and the Eclipse of the Sacred
    • Essay 11 - The Rebirth of the Sacred


BIBLIOGRAPHY

I. Textual Criticism & Scribal Culture

Tov, Emanuel. Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible. 3rd ed. Fortress Press, 2012.
Ulrich, Eugene. The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Developmental Composition of the Bible. Brill, 2015.
Petersen, David L. & Richards, Kent Harold, eds. Interpreting Hebrew Poetry. Augsburg Fortress, 1992.
Carr, David M. Writing on the Tablet of the Heart: Origins of Scripture and Literature. Oxford University Press, 2005.
Schmid, Konrad. The Old Testament: A Literary History. Fortress, 2012.
Würthwein, Ernst. The Text of the Old Testament. Eerdmans, 2014.
Schniedewind, William. How the Bible Became a Book: The Textualization of Ancient Israel. Cambridge, 2004.
Van der Toorn, Karel. Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible. Harvard University Press, 2007.
Schorch, Stefan. “The Samaritan Pentateuch and the Origin of the Samaritan Community.” Journal of Biblical Literature 128 (2009).

II. Redaction Criticism, Literary Criticism & Composition

Noth, Martin. The Deuteronomistic History. Sheffield Academic, 1981.
Friedman, Richard Elliott. Who Wrote the Bible? Harper & Row, 1987.
Baden, Joel S. The Composition of the Pentateuch: Renewing the Documentary Hypothesis. Yale University Press, 2012.
Dozeman, Thomas. Pentateuchal Studies and the Future of Biblical Interpretation. Eisenbrauns, 2017.
Blum, Erhard. Studien zur Komposition des Pentateuch. de Gruyter, 1990.
Römer, Thomas. The Invention of God. Harvard University Press, 2015.
Stackert, Jeffrey. A Prophet Like Moses: Prophecy, Law, and Israelite Religion. Oxford University Press, 2014.
Carr, David M. The Formation of the Hebrew Bible: A New Reconstruction. Oxford University Press, 2011.

III. Canon Formation & Second Temple Judaism

VanderKam, James C. The Dead Sea Scrolls Today. 3rd ed. Eerdmans, 2010.
Sanders, James A. From Sacred Story to Sacred Text: Canon as Paradigm. Fortress Press, 1987.
Collins, John J. The Bible After Babel: Historical Criticism in a Postmodern Age. Eerdmans, 2005.
Beckwith, Roger. The Old Testament Canon of the New Testament Church. Eerdmans, 1985.
Sæbø, Magne, ed. Hebrew Bible / Old Testament: The History of Its Interpretation. Vol. 1–3. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.
Sundberg, Albert C. The Old Testament of the Early Church. Harvard Theological Review, 1964.
Flint, Peter W. The Bible at Qumran: Text, Shape, and Interpretation. Eerdmans, 2001.
Hendel, Ronald & Joosten, Jan. How Old Is the Hebrew Bible? Yale, 2018.
Hanhart, Robert. The Septuagint as a Translation. Scholars Press, 1992.

IV. Ancient Near Eastern Comparative Studies

Smith, Mark S. The Origins of Biblical Monotheism. Oxford University Press, 2001.
Foster, Benjamin. Before the Muses: An Anthology of Akkadian Literature. CDL Press, 2005.
Coogan, Michael. Stories from Ancient Canaan. Westminster John Knox, 1978.
Hallo, William & Younger, K. Lawson, eds. The Context of Scripture. 3 vols. Brill, 1997–2002.
Frymer-Kensky, Tikva. In the Wake of the Goddesses. Fawcett Columbine, 1992.
Levenson, Jon D. Creation and the Persistence of Evil. Harper & Row, 1988.
Lambert, W. G. Babylonian Creation Myths. Eisenbrauns, 2013.
Oppenheim, A. Leo. Ancient Mesopotamia: Portrait of a Dead Civilization. University of Chicago Press, 1977.

V. Historical-Critical Hermeneutics & Biblical Theology

Brueggemann, Walter. Theology of the Old Testament. Fortress, 1997.
Childs, Brevard. Introduction to the Old Testament as Scripture. Fortress, 1979.
Seitz, Christopher. Prophecy and Hermeneutics. Baker Academic, 2007.
Newsom, Carol A. The Book of Job: A Contest of Moral Imaginations. Oxford, 2003.
Goldingay, John. Old Testament Theology. Vols. 1–3. InterVarsity Press, 2003–2009.
Kugel, James. How to Read the Bible: A Guide to Scripture Then and Now. Free Press, 2007.

VI. Process Theology, Theological Hermeneutics, and Reconstruction

Whitehead, Alfred North. Process and Reality. Free Press, 1978.
Cobb, John B. Jr. A Christian Natural Theology. Westminster John Knox, 1965.
Suchocki, Marjorie. God, Christ, Church. Crossroad, 1982.
Keller, Catherine. On the Mystery. Fortress Press, 2008.
Clayton, Philip. The Problem of God in Modern Thought. Eerdmans, 2000.
Hartshorne, Charles. The Divine Relativity. Yale, 1948.
Neville, Robert Cummings. Reimagining the Sacred. SUNY Press, 2012.

VII. Additional Authors Relevant to “Inerrancy” and Biblical Authority

Barton, John. The Nature of Biblical Authority. Westminster, 1983.
Enns, Peter. Inspiration and Incarnation. Baker Academic, 2005.
McDonald, Lee Martin. The Formation of the Christian Biblical Canon. Hendrickson, 1995.
Bruce, F. F. The Canon of Scripture. InterVarsity Press, 1988.
Leiman, Sid Z. The Canonization of Hebrew Scripture. Jewish Theological Seminary, 1976.
Barr, James. Fundamentalism. SCM Press, 1977.
Heschel, Abraham Joshua. God in Search of Man. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1955.

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